AAAAAAAA AAAAA AA AAAAAA

[davidn]

We went to the supermarket, I went down the cereal aisle to get the usual Just Bunches (Eng: acceptable substitute) and Frosted Flakes (Eng: Frosties), turned around and nearly fell flat on my face.

They appear to be at an experimental stage at the moment, with tiny boxes and even a mail-in rebate to get them free - a new concept to me when I arrived in this country and a completely unheard of concept for breakfast cereal especially. So I got eighteen two boxes - you may be able to make out from the photograph that there are actually two varieties, the normal kind and a sort of round biscuit arrangement that's new for America, unless they have evolved in Britain in my absence. So I'm hoping, firstly, that the flake edition is the same thing, and that they catch on enough to stay.

And already this year, America has got just a tiny bit better.

Comments

[ravenworks.livejournal.com]

You find something again after so long an absence, and you haven't even tried it yet?? I mean, granted, cereal always manages to taste different later in the day for some reason (it doesn't have that natural infusion of morning breath?), but still :D

[davidn]

Tragically I feel it would be unwise just now, as I have the sorest throat ever and can't even speak, so I'm limiting myself to soup... however, it must be said that I've been kept going by supplies sent over by my parents once in a while, so I haven't been away from them for four straight years :) It's... weird to see them in a supermarket, though - I'm sure my eyes popped out of my head for a moment.

[ravenworks.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow. :( Poor guy...

And, shoot, nice. ;) So you'll be in a better position to compare the two versions, instead of just comparing it to distant, nostalgia-enriched memories ;)

[shoe--gal.livejournal.com]

Oooooh! Wonder if they've made it to the west coast? Let us know when you've tried them if they taste the same or whether they've been liberally doused in sugar for the US market. We find most cereals over here are way too sweet.

[davidn]

I took a chance and tried them tonight. I think that there's very slightly more brown sugar in them, but I could be just looking for things that I perceive to be different after so long of not having had any that hadn't spent a while in somebody's luggage. Whitney doesn't taste a difference, so perhaps they really are the same - either way, they're definitely an acceptably genuine article.

The things that I had thought were round flat biscuity things are actually just like Honey Nut Loops, they're much smaller than depicted.

[diarytypething.livejournal.com]

Have you actually started eating enough cereal to become a commercially viable market for the stuff?

[davidn]

I wouldn't have thought so, but until now I had just accepted that they were something that I was just going to have to import, and mostly have as just a memory of my old life - so I'm... pleased that whatever it was happened to start making them available here!

[kytheraen.livejournal.com]

those things look like fat cheerios.no, no we don't have those gere. yay for another kellogg's crunchy nut :3

[davidn]

They are! The box made them look more like round flat flakes of... something, but they're tubby Cheerios that are slightly... nuttier and less sweet. From what I distantly remember of them, I think they might be Honey Nut Loops rebranded to fit into this single name.

I don't know how this obsession got started - I never regarded them as anything particularly special until I realized that like so many things, you couldn't get them in America. By this point I'd just accepted that it wasn't going to happen, so I could hardly believe my eyes when they were suddenly there.

Bringing America slowly back to colonial rule.

[stubbleupdate.livejournal.com]

2010 - The beginning of healthcare for poor people
2011 - Crunchy Nut Cornflakes

Re: Bringing America slowly back to colonial rule.

[davidn]

Change has come to America! Small steps in making the country slightly less awful.

[kjorteo]

I just had a similar level of completely unexpected grocery-related excitement today when I was out shopping and saw some dry pasta-in-a-bag-style tortelloni/tortellini... I wasn't aware until today that that was even possible. I had only ever seen it frozen before. I wasn't sure how on earth that even can even be done (now that I've actually had some, I am fairly confident that it is due to turning the cheese stuffing into a powdered/dehydrated brick) but naturally I had to have it, even if bag pasta is usually just my "crap, it's dinner time and I just realized that I forgot to make bread this morning" food. (Which, incidentally, is precisely why it being in a dry non-perishable fit-to-outlast-the-zombie-apocalypse state is important.)

[davidn]

It's the little things, isn't it ;) I remember that dried pasta from LIDL was much better than it had any right to be, as well (although probably not in terms of healthiness) - and that supermarket made it from Germany to Britain eventually, so it's only got another three thousand miles to go.

[tamakun.livejournal.com]

eighteen, indeed - I saw your FB picture ;)

[davidn]

Well, I'd like to reaffirm that I'm not completely insane - that picture was taken at my parents' house two years ago, after my mother had apparently kept buying a packet of them every time she visited the supermarket even in my absence. I never managed to transport that entire tower over, but the thought was appreciated...